FEATURE: Spotlight: Meet Me @ The Altar

FEATURE:

Spotlight

Meet Me @ The Altar

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I feel like I am…

PHOTO CREDIT: Meet Me @ The Altar in Orlando, November 2020/PHOTO CREDIT: Lindsey Byrnes for Rolling Stone

late to the party. Or should that be late to the wedding?! Maybe not as well-known in the U.K. as their native U.S., that is going to change very soon. The inspiring and wonderful Meet Me @ The Altar are a Pop-Punk band who formed back in 2015. I think that they have really broken through the past year or so. I wanted to spotlight them, as they are going to be a mighty force through this year. The trio consists of Edith Victoria, Téa Campbell, Ada Juare, with their members hailing from Florida, Georgia and New Jersey. Go and pre-order their album, Past // Present // Future. It is out on 10th March, and it will confirm that Meet Me @ The Altar are one of the most important and exciting groups around. I love a trio. I am not sure what it is but, whether it Meet Me @ The Altar or HAIM, there is something about the chemistry and configuration that makes the music that much stronger! I am going to bring in a few interviews with the trio. I will start by going back to 2021. It must have been hard for artists to make a name and headway during the pandemic. Whilst Meet Me @ The Altar have been on the scene for a few years now, I think that 2020 and 2021 were years when they were especially busy. They were definitely being noticed but, unable to tour much, it must have been frustrating! Rolling Stone spoke with them in 2021. Revising and updating a genre that was at its peak in the ‘90s and early-’00s, it is no surprise that they have captured a large and loving audience:

“SINCE POP PUNK broke through in the Nineties, the genre’s most prominent faces have been largely white (not unlike dozens of other scenes). But as the music industry begins waking up to its history of race and gender inequality, one band is ready to rewrite that unspoken rule: Meet Me @ the Altar, one of 2021’s most exciting new rock acts.

Guitarist-bassist Téa Campbell, 20, and drummer Ada Juarez, 22, met online in 2015 after Campbell stumbled upon Juarez’s drum cover of a Twenty One Pilots song. Despite living in different states (Florida and New Jersey, respectively), the two became fast friends and decided to start a band. They held online auditions, where Edith Johnson, 20, tried out by singing Paramore’s “All I Wanted”; the Georgia native wasn’t chosen at first, but she was persistent. “Edith supported us throughout the two years that she wasn’t in the band,” Campbell says. “She was literally texting me every day [asking]: ‘Are you guys looking for another singer?’” In 2017, Johnson got the gig.

Last year, the trio signed with Fueled by Ramen, the Warner Music-backed label responsible for launching some of the band members’ biggest influences — including both Paramore and Twenty One Pilots, as well as A Day To Remember and Fall Out Boy — and re-released the single “Garden.” An exhilarating blast of sticky-sweet vocals, fluttery electric riffs, and a dangerously catchy chorus (“Your flowers will finally grow!”), it’s all but guaranteed to have you longing for the days of black eyeliner and studded belts. “I don’t think any of us have fully wrapped our heads around [the record deal] yet,” Campbell says. “We grew up idolizing these people our whole lives, and now we’re on the same label as them.”

The band first caught the attention of Elektra Music Group vp of A&R Johnny Minardi after some supportive tweets from All-Time Low’s Alex Gaskarth and The Wonder Years’ Dan Campbell (“I remember screaming when I saw all the notifications,” Johnson says). The members have also benefited from Halsey’s Black Creators Fund, which offers financial support and resources for black artists in need.

Still, their rise to success hasn’t been without challenges. On many occasions, they recall feeling like they had to prove themselves worthy while booking small gigs. “We would have to play with the local bands, but they’re all white dudes who didn’t really want us there,” Campbell recalls. “They were never explicit about it, but you can just tell. So it isn’t fun. But at the same time, we had to go through it for it to pay off the way that it did.”

When it hit in May 2020, “Garden” and its uplifting spirit provided many pop-punk fans with some much-needed comfort during quarantine’s peak. “It’s OK to not be OK, and you have people who are there for you,” Campbell says. “We wanted to get that message across to everyone. We didn’t know coronavirus and protests were going to happen, but it was a message that the world really needed to hear throughout all of that.”

The band members weren’t too fazed by the new ways of communication that quarantine required: In MM@TA’s early stages, the Gen Z musicians created songs over voice notes. “We grew up with technology,” Johnson says. “So it’s just like texting normally, but having the idea, recording it, and being like, ‘What do you think about this?’”

One of their biggest hopes for 2021 is to continue shattering boundaries so that more artists of color get a platform. “When shows come back, venues need to book diverse bands,” Johnson says. “Pay attention to your scene — and make sure your show lineup is not just all white, straight cis men”.

Even though I have said Meet Ne @ The Altar are largely known in the U.S., they are actually getting a lot of taction in the U.K. For that reason, I do hope that they come and play here throughout 2023. There is definitely going to be demand for them. DIY featured the tremendous trio back in December. Completing a successful and awesome year for Meet Me @ The Altar, there is that excitement and anticipation around an album. It is clear that the group are not planning on applying the brakes anytime soon:

“Having packed in their day jobs to take the band full time, and with global tours and festival appearances under their belt, Meet Me @ The Altar have no plans to slow it down. In fact, their frustration at a current limbo between touring and the release of their debut album - due in the spring - is palpable. “We want to be a household name!” Téa exclaims with infectious ambition. “We want to be one of the greats. We fully believe with our entire being that we’re going to get to that place we want to be. We know we are going to get exactly what we want.”

That their moment has come seven years after forming doesn’t deter them either. “If anything, we’re stronger than ever before,” Edith says, mirroring Téa’s self-belief. “Once you get a little taste of something, you want a lot more. It’s definitely stronger, and very much here. You want to keep going and going and going.” “That’s literally the secret,” Téa laughs. “That’s how we got here. You have to be delusional as fuck and you have to do the work.”

PHOTO CREDIT: Ben Bentley

Their new music looks to continue that trajectory, and finds Meet Me @ The Altar still working very much on their own terms. Self-described as in the world of rock but a softer step away from easy-core, it’s set to propel them onto new stages in front of diverse audiences. They’ve recently completed shows with queer alt-pop powerhouse MUNA and are heavily inspired by Taylor Swift’s recently announced shows with Paramore, Phoebe Bridgers, HAIM, Beabadoobee and more - breaking boundaries and celebrating women in music, regardless of genre.

“I feel like artists and bands confine themselves too much in a certain box sometimes because it’s comfortable and that’s what they’re used to,” Téa expands. “I feel like you can only grow so much if you are stuck with the same thing. It’s cool to branch out.”

It’s all part of the band’s subtle mission to change the face of rock, and to show the world that music can stretch beyond and embrace all. “There’s a lot of beauty in thinking about when people will just see any band like how they see a bunch of white dudes up there,” Edith concludes. “A lot of our fans that really ride or die for us, they just see a band and we just happen to be who we are. The act of just being us is really enough”.

PHOTO CREDIT: Jonathan Weiner

I am going to end with a very recent interview from NME. They mentioned how the debut album, Past // Present // Future, marries upbeat tunes with deep messages about empowerment, representation and a brighter tomorrow. It is the kind of music that I think that we all need to hear and learn from. There is no doubt that, when Meet Me @ The Altar on embark on their headline U.S. tour in March, they will receive so much adulation and electricity from the crowds. They, in turn, deliver absolutely incredible live performances:

“Meet Me @ The Altar’s history goes back to 2015, when Campbell commented on bandmate Ada Juarez’s Twenty One Pilots drum cover on YouTube. The two started talking, eventually coming to the decision to form a band, and they held auditions on YouTube for a singer. Lead vocalist Edith Victoria submitted a cover of Paramore’s ‘All I Wanted’ and ended up joining the band in 2017. With all three of them spread across the East Coast of the US – Campbell in Florida, Juarez in New Jersey and Victoria in Georgia – the band wrote songs remotely, meeting up to play shows whenever they could.

After years of grafting across their local touring circuits, the band went viral over the summer of 2020. After Halsey named them recipients of their Black Creators Fund, Meet Me @ The Altar’s streams skyrocketed, as audiences sought to diversify their listening following the Black Lives Matter protests in response to the murder of George Floyd. “It’s been great, but it’s also really bittersweet and a little sad that it happened this way,” Victoria told NME previously.

Simultaneously, pop punk was experiencing a revival at the time, and Meet Me @ The Altar became part of a cohort of artists, including Pinkshift, KennyHoopla and De’Wayne, that formed a newer, more diverse, incarnation of the traditionally white and male genre. Meet Me @ The Altar have since worked tirelessly to create space for women and people of colour in alternative music. “It’s really important for us to be able to make people feel comfortable in a space that they normally wouldn’t have and to be able to actually see the diversity in the crowd,” Campbell says today. “When we went to [rock] shows [as teenagers], we never experienced that. So for us to be bringing these people together is so cool. It just drives us to keep going.”

They hope to encourage future generations of alternative musicians to pursue their dreams as well. “We are running so other people can walk,” Juarez says. “We wanted to show all of these little girls that they can do [music] too. There’s so many different ways to get to where we are today – and I feel like it’s just so inspiring”.

A trio that I cannot recommend highly enough, I think that this year is going to be the biggest year for them. Go and follow them on social media, and ensure that you pre-order your copy of Past // Present // Future. As you can hear from the songs I have included in this video, they are a monumental talented group that are going to conquer the music world! Edith Victoria, Téa Campbell, Ada Juare are truly wonderful musicians and songwriters. If you have a few moments today, check out their music and make sure that you…